There are many reasons for being angry with Laurent Gbagbo, whose belligerence has thrust Ivory Coast back into the eye of the storm and threatened to undo any democratic gains of the past decade. For a man who made ultimate political capital from opposing the strongman rule of Félix Houphouët Boigny, it is a chilling commentary on African politics that Gbagbo now seeks to cement his place as one, refusing to hand over power after losing November's presidential election.

Yet it may be easy to understand – without condoning – Gbagbo's stance. He must be wondering why the international community has singled him out for special attention when it hasn't acted with such aggression towards Robert Mugabe or Mwai Kibaki. The events of the past month certainly remind us of disconcerting truths about the brand of democracy in many African countries and elsewhere in the developing world, truths that the pressure for optimism often forces us to wish away.

Consider these cases: in Zimbabwe, the question, in April 2008, was not whether Mugabe had lost an election held in a climate of state-inspired brutality, but whether he would "agree" to leave power. He refused, and was forced by a crumbling economy into a power-sharing arrangement with Morgan Tsvangirai, of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). He is now rumoured to want to end what he sees as the indignity of sharing power. More elections are due, with Mugabe saying recently they would be free and fair "as they always are".

And then there is Kenya. Around 1,300 people died in the violence that followed the presidential election in 2007, in which Kibaki was declared the winner. He refused to relinquish power, before international pressure forced him to share a political bed with rival Raila Odinga. Another thorny union in which ethnically aligned rival supporters are reportedly already buying guns in preparation for the elections next year. While Kibaki will not contest, thanks to the two-term constitutional limit, ethnic polarisation – especially between the Kikuyu and Luo communities – means we can expect another highly charged electoral period.

One man who knows how to beat term limits is Yoweri Museveni, president of Uganda for almost a quarter of a century. Museveni controversially abolished presidential term limits in 2005, and next month he will contest his fourth election. A topical question is already being asked, even by Ugandan voters: what would happen if, like Gbagbo, Museveni lost power? Some of his previous utterances provide a clue to the man's mind.

Two yeas ago, as Mugabe was declaring that "MDC will never rule this country", Museveni was quoted in the Ugandan media as saying he would not have handed over power if the opposition had won the elections in 1996 and 2001. Only last year, a former Museveni minister told a national newspaper that he had been at a meeting in which it was discussed that the army planned to seize power if Museveni lost the 2001 polls. Not that the question itself is new: in 2001, CNN's Catherine Bond asked Museveni if he would leave if he lost the election and Museveni's response was telling: "I will not lose the elections. So that is completely academic. But of course, [inaudible] why not?" Compare that with Gbagbo's campaign slogan in 2010, "we win or we win", and you realise that Africa's elections function on a different logic.

Ideally, elections are held to choose leaders, but in many cases in Africa, elections are either intended to launder regimes that fought their way to power, or otherwise dress up despots in democratic garb – so the idea of losing is academic. In these neopatrimonial states, the big man, like Mugabe or Museveni, believes only he has the capacity and the right to rule. Hence, Museveni sees "no one else with the vision" to lead Uganda, and Mugabe believes Tsvangirai cannot lead Zimbawe because he did not fight for independence.

With such logic, elections are routinely rigged - the Ugandan courts have found the previous two presidential polls were. And if the rigging falls short, there must be a mechanism in place to announce the big man as the winner.

In Kenya, Zimbabwe and Ivory Coast, the pressure to end the chaos has come from abroad. Whether such pressure can be sustainable is questionable, but perhaps Ivory Coast represents a watershed for African democracy – the optimistic exceptions of countries such as Ghana and Botswana notwithstanding.